


A Relationship

by ninosbrain



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-07
Updated: 2014-09-07
Packaged: 2018-02-16 12:09:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2269173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninosbrain/pseuds/ninosbrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Relationships aren't always happy</p><p>Cophine</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Relationship

Cosima lounged in her leather desk chair with a soft backed book in her hand. A picture of a faded child's face and the words  _Your Child's Old Soul: Past Life Regression_  covered the front. Cosima was not a believer of previous lives, and despised reading about it, but she read on anyway.

 

The apartment door opened and Delphine stepped in with a small plastic bag of groceries. Her hair was plaited in pigtails, Cosima noted as she bent to unpack her bag into the small fridge.

 

“I like you hair, today.”

 

Delphine gave a small hum to show she had heard her. Her shoulders were slightly hunched and her face had lost its glow. She didn't radiate that playful giddiness Cosima had grown accustomed to anymore. It was like she had aged and matured without her.

 

Delphine placed a box of Nerdz on the desk just out of Cosima's reach and continued to the bathroom. She heard the shower running as she shimmed up her chairs back to reach the sweets.

 

____

 

“I don't deserve this, you know. I don't.”

 

Cosima looked up from her desk to find her girlfriend. She was riffling through a pile of folded laundry. Her hair was still damp, but tightly pulled back into a pony tail. Cosima loved combing through Delphine's hair when it was wet. She loved how it changed colour as it dried and she would make groves through it with the comb and watch the straight lines start to bend into their natural curls. Then she would slice the comb through again and again watching the groves dance. She would flip it all to one side, then part it down the middle, twist it, spike it; enjoying the sound, the feel, the smell. It made Cosima happy and Delphine was content to just sit on a cushion on the floor, eyes closed, leaning back against Cosima's legs, allowing the ministrations to meditate her busy mind.

 

Delphine pulled a white tank top from the pile and faced Cosima, pulling on the garment over her naked torso. Cosima waited silently for her to continue.

 

“I don't deserve a sick girlfriend. I wanted a relationship with someone who doesn't embarrass me and call me out of work early because they're too lightheaded to stand up and take their pain medication.”

 

Her words stung, but Cosima didn't let her blank face slip. She cleared a dry tickle in her throat and turned back to her book when Delphine rolled her eyes at the familiar sound and stormed into the bedroom. There was a small  _flump_  and a pause, then hollow  _thwack_ as a book skidded into the living room.

 

“Can you  _please_ pick you shit up off the ground, god damn it, Cosima!”

______

Cosima sat opposite the wall the small kitchen table was pushed against, forearms on her lap, her forehead pressed against the cool wood. Delphine placed a jug of water in the middle of the table already laden with steaming food. Cosima picked up her cutlery only when her best friend sat perpendicular to her.

 

“This looks delicious, thank you.”

 

Delphine wordlessly filled Cosima's glass then her own, placing a finger across the lip of the jug to prevent ice cubes plopping into her glass. After a lengthily silence, Delphine spoke.

 

“What did you do today.”

 

It didn't sound like a question. Cosima slowly spun pasta around in her spoon.

 

“I was reading last night after you fell asleep and I found a spelling mistake and I wanted to find it again today.”

 

“Productive.” Silence. “Did you do the things on the note I left you?”

 

Cosima didn't answer. She found the note when she woke that afternoon, but she had forgotten all about it. She focused on her half empty plate.

 

“God, why do I even bother with you.” Delphine stood and all but threw her empty plate into the sink, her voice raising in volume as she walked into the bedroom. “I ask you to do two simple things, Cosima. I left a cloth by the note, you just had to dust and water the plants. Damn you!”

 

Cosima's forced her jaw to chew the already more than purified food in her mouth.

______

Delphine made her frustration known as she dusted every surface in the apartment. Cosima picked up her book from where it lay open and upside down on her desk and shuffled to their bed in measured steps.

 

Her back lay against the middle of the headboard, propped up by two pillows. She noted her lover had calmed down as she stretched over the counter to water the plants on the windowsill and closed the large windows to the cooling evening breeze and bugs. Cosima knew it was because she didn't like the noise of cars passing at night.

 

Cosima pulled the box of tissues on her side of the bed closer to her.

 

Delphine placed the glass she used for the plants upside down on the draining board and stepped into the archway to the bedroom. Cosima chanced a look and found her looking back. She wasn't sure if Delphine could even see her through the tears in her eyes that stubbornly refused to fall.

 

“I'm so tired, Cosima.”

 

Her voice was strained and quiet, and she hiccoughed back a sob before her third word. She looked like a child who had seen her first scary film and wasn't quite sure how to deal with what was happening inside her mind.

 

Cosima stretched out her crossed legs and set her book aside in invitation.

 

Delphine walked to her girlfriend and sat sideways in between her legs. She curled up and set her head just below her right collar bone. Cosima's heart soared and she wrapped her arms around her as tightly as she could, covering Delphine's exposed ear with her left hand. She tucked up her legs and squeezed the sobs out of her.

 

Cosima rocked her soul mate, supporting her tired weight. She didn't let herself relax into the pillows behind her so she could tuck her face as close to Delphine's as possible, blocking out all the light she could. Dark and quiet soothed her girlfriend's mind. Her back was searing and threatening to lock up, but she really could not have cared less at the moment. Her love was finally opening up and letting her touch her again and Cosima wasn't going to waste this private moment.

 

They sat like this for as long as they needed. Cosima archived this moment in her mind. Both breathing at equal pacing so their bodies never tipped even slightly off balance, their heat was the perfect temperature, she took in every scent, the feeling of Delphine's moist breath against her chest and left arm that held her head, the fuzzy sound of almost silence.

 

“I'm so in love with you.” Delphine whispered, her voice crisp.

 

Cosima nuzzled her nose against her forehead and allowed it to be lifted as Delphine opened from her safe cocoon. She pushed away enough to clearly see her lover's face. Cosima melted into the pillows behind her taking in the beauty of the shiny eyed, pink nosed woman sitting on her lap. She reached to the tissue box next to her and pressed one into her hand. Delphine gave a watery smile and shook her head minutely.

 

“I am sorry. I hurt you, and I am sorry.”

 

Cosima waited for her to mop her eyes and nose.

 

“You were right, though. You don't deserve this. Neither do I. We don't.” Cosima looked past Delphine to find her words and shifted where her legs were cramping. “Sometimes I wish I had never met you so you didn't have to deal with this. But only for a second. I can't imagine going through this alone, so I'm selfishly glad you're in hell, too.”

 

Cosima could see her processing her words.

 

“I wish I was brave enough to tell you to leave and go on with your life. But I'm fucking terrified, Delphine. I'm so fucking scared of this thing. But, my god, does it seem ten times less scary when I have you next to me.”

 

Delphine's face remained emotionless.

 

“I can't wait until you're better again.”

 

“Me neither.”

 

“I miss having sex with you.”

 

“I miss it, too.”

 

“This is crap.”

 

Cosima smiled toothily at that, the whole room lightened. “Yeah, it is.”

 

“How were you today? Is your back sore? Do you want a massage?”

 

“Ugh. More than anything.”

 

Delphine scrambled off Cosima and pulled her girlfriend's UMN hoodie of over her head. Cosima lay face down and her muscles responded and relaxed under Delphine's practiced hands immediately. Her fingers pressed up and down the side of her spine and down the edges of her bare back. She felt out and kneaded each knot. It felt like she had unblocked a dam as cool tingles pulsed through the newly refreshed areas.

 

“Did you find that spelling mistake again?”

 

“Yeah. They left out the second 'n' in phenomenon.”

 

“Phenomeon. What were you reading?”

 

“ _Your Child's Old Soul: Past Life Regression .”_

 

“Oh! I've been meaning to read that one! You know, I recently read about a little boy in Britain who could recall memories of a past life on an island in the 1940s. They went to the island, and it turns out everything the boy had said was historically correct!”

 

Cosima told Delphine all about the accounts of the people in her book, much to the blonde's delight. She still wasn't a fan of the subject, but she was a huge fan of her girlfriend.

 


End file.
